Richard Branson announced that Virgin Atlantic in partnership with Kiwi LanzaTech and Swedish Biofuels would be teaming up to produce jet fuel from recycling waste gas from industrial steel production. They estimate that the process could be applied to 65% of the worlds steel mills potentially saving/recycling a lot of carbon dioxide that otherwise would go straight into the atmosphere. There is still a long way to go however. A ‘demo’ flight with the new fuel is planned in 12-18 months and in the words of CEO of LanzaTech “While there is still work to be done and logistical hurdles to cross,” …. “we are confident that we will have a facility with the capacity to produce fuel for commercial use by 2014.”

Detailed analysis on this next generation technology suggests the fuel will produce around a 50% saving in lifecycle carbon emissions.

Virgin press release and Richard Branson’s Blog.

And I didn’t even notice the pun in the title until after. Maybe when I reach a pun per sentence I can call myself a journalist.